Amend standing orders to allow an opposition MP to chair Government Assurance Committee – MP proposes

The Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has proposed an amendment to Standing Orders (Order 174) to allow the opposition in parliament to head the government assurance committee.

The MP wonders why the government’s guarantee that the IMF deal will be completed by the end of March 2023 fell through.

He is also demanding that the government apologise to the people and explain why the assurance failed.

To end this, he has proposed for the assurance committee of parliament to be chaired by an opposition MP to provide for strict consequences for grand governmental deception.

He wrote “What should happen when a President and his top officials assure Parliament and the entire nation on multiple occasions that Ghana will secure an IMF bailout deal by March this year?

Should the citizenry, like their government functionaries pretend that March didn’t end five days ago?

Don’t Ghanaians deserve an apology and an explanation at the very least?

Is that the superior competence the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia/Ofori-Atta government proclaims?

Why did so many experts, civil society, and the opposition foresee that a March deal was ridiculously impossible, and yet President Akufo-Addo kept issuing firmer assurances including when he delivered his Message on the State of the Nation in Parliament?

Moving forward, there’s an urgent need to amend Parliament’s Standing Orders (Order 174) to expressly make an opposition MP the Chair of the Committee on Government Assurances and to provide for strict consequences for grand governmental deception. Leadership must respect the Ghanaian people.”